As the medical understanding of the potential long lasting and sometimes permanent effects of head trauma can have on affected individuals has increased, there has been an appreciation of the fact that protective headgear can reduce such trauma significantly in many cases.
Various potential applications for protective headgear include baseball games, golf matches and/or other sporting events where participants and/or fans may be hit with a ball or other flying object. In addition to ball impacts, a person may fall or collide with another person or object while cycling, skating, skate boarding, or taking part in activities on the ski slopes. such impacts may also be of concern.
While balls are often the objects which first come to mind as a potential source of head trauma at a sporting event, bottles and/or other objects thrown by crowds are another potential source of head trauma. While players are often the victims of ball strikes, police and/or other security forces are often the individuals who suffer from thrown bottles and/or impacts to the head from unruly fans or crowds. Accordingly, in addition to a need for protective headgear for sports participants, there is also a need for protective headgear for security personal and/or fans.
While wearing protective headgear at sporting events such as baseball and golf games offer some protection from impacts, conventional headgear has many drawbacks which remain to be addressed.
In order to provide adequate protection from baseballs and/or other objects which may reach speeds of many miles an hour, conventional approaches to protective headgear may result in helmets which are heavy, unsightly and/or have a tendency to trap heat. The unsightly nature of conventional helmets designs results in people tending not to wear them because they may cause an individual to stand out in a crowd or appear unsightly. The problem of weight and trapping of heat relate to a helmet being uncomfortable to wear due to the heavy nature of a helmet and/or the helmet causing the wearer to overheat leading to a tendency for the user to frequently remove the helmet and/or discontinue use.
At present, baseball/golf caps offer little protection for the head from flying balls while heavy helmets are unsuitable for many applications. In addition, while there are protective helmets that some people wear whilst carrying out activities such as bicycling and skateboarding, as noted above, existing helmets can be hot and uncomfortable. Furthermore, the weight can put undue stress on the delicate neck muscles because they are heavy and cumbersome which may contribute to broken necks in some accidents where the wearer is involved in a collision. With many existing helmets the wearer's sense of hearing is impaired because the ears are partially or fully covered by the helmet. This can cause anxiety and a lack of communication, which can lead to danger. Aesthetically, many people also prefer to wear their favorite hats instead of a cumbersome helmet.
Previous inventions and designs have proposed rigid plastic and foam inserts for hats such as those described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,439,871, 5,289,591, 5,519,895, 5,437,064, 5,657,492, 7,096,512.
There have been many protective headgear suggestions in the past. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,439,871 (referred to above) to Plastino, discloses a single shell consisting of a rigid unreinforced plastic which is relatively heavy and discloses an inner circular foam piece for the op of the head. The sides, front and back of the head fail to provide comprehensive protection to the head and the rigid plastic may tend to transfer the impact force rather than absorb and distribute it.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,289,591 to Anderson discloses a rigid plastic shell with many ventilation holes and a cutout section to fit inside an adjustable exterior baseball cap. The shell is unlikely to provide any real protection with the many holes weakening the strength and impact protection of the shell and the lack of a foam liner.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,519,895 to Barnes discloses a baseball type cap for over a sports helmet. It fits over the helmet with a special elastic band. There is no means of identification that a helmet is under the hat and there is no specific helmet to accompany the cap.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,269,026 to McManus discloses a safety liner, which is adjustable and only partially encircles the head.
In the inventor's previous U.S. Pat. No. 7,096,512 and Australian No. 2001293515, a double layer protective insert provides impact protection to the general skull area. While the described protective devices offers many advantages over previous protective systems, the design left room for improvement with regard to impact protection, heat dissipation, wear ability and/or the ability to detect that insert was in use under a cap.
In view of the above discussion, it should be appreciated that there is a need for new and improved protective headgear. It is an object of the present invention to address one or more the problems of the existing protection devices as are described above, and provide a protective insert and/or hat assembly which provides suitable protection to the wearer. While not necessary it would be desirable if at least in some embodiments the protective headgear has a pleasing aesthetic appearance while still providing suitable impact protection.